


Mistletoe

by Gem_Gem, KittieHill



Series: Christmas Prompts [13]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: A-Z Christmas Prompt, First Kiss, John is a Mess, Kissing, M/M, Mistletoe, Mistletoe kissing, Mrs. Hudson Ships It, Pining John, Sherlock Being Sherlock, Sherlock Holmes & John Watson Friendship, Sherlock Holmes Has Feelings, Tenderness, Tension, face kisses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:28:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21782206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gem_Gem/pseuds/Gem_Gem, https://archiveofourown.org/users/KittieHill/pseuds/KittieHill
Summary: Pulling his keys from the lock and swaying up and in, John flinched when something touched the top of his head and reared back to look, terrified of what he might find, what Sherlock might have hung there, only find it to be a plant attached to the inside of the door frame, a rather familiar looking plant.Mistletoe.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Series: Christmas Prompts [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1559605
Comments: 10
Kudos: 145





	Mistletoe

John sighed as he pushed open the front door, almost falling bodily against as he did so and tripping up the step. He felt exhausted, mentally and physically drained from yet another day of seemingly endless dull patients and paperwork. Patients that he didn't really need to see and whom didn't really need to see him. Patients with colds. Lots and lots of patients with colds. A mild cold was not the flu, a cold was a cold. There was little to be done about it, little to give and prescribe beyond advising them to get plenty of rest, drink lots of fluids, and to gargle warm salt water. The common cold usually resolved itself in seven to ten days, with some symptoms remaining for up to three weeks. It wasn't worth visiting the local GP. Not at all. Pulling his keys from the lock and swaying up and in, John flinched when something touched the top of his head and reared back to look, terrified of what he might find, what Sherlock might have hung there, only find it to be a plant attached to the inside of the door frame, a rather familiar looking plant.  
  
Mistletoe.  
  
Closing the door behind him and shrugging off his coat, John looked around suspiciously for any more, for anything worse, and then headed up the stairs, noticing more above the top step when he reached the landing. He eyed it, looked at its placement, glanced down the steps, and wondered how on earth Mrs Hudson had managed without falling and breaking her neck, not liking how close it was to the sharp decline when he imagined her balancing on her old rickety ladders. Surely it wasn’t with it just to put up a bit of foliage?

Grumbling unhappily under his breath, John walked through the kitchen door and looked for Sherlock, surprised he hadn’t heard the man yelling the first moment he’d come home. There was no sign of him however, nothing but more of the mistletoe, which hung above the glass door leading into the corridor, on the border between kitchen and living room, and in the centre of the living room, hanging from one of the light fixtures. It was slightly ridiculous. It was overkill. It was frankly, quite mortifying, especially as John thought he knew what Mrs Hudson was trying to do. Something he should have known would happen, sooner or later.  
  
Putting his bag down on his chair in passing, John walked to the centre of the room and stood on his tiptoes, trying to reach up and unhook the mistletoe from its place, but his shoulder twinged unpleasantly and no matter how hard he tried, how much he stretched, he wasn't able to reach.   
  
“ _John_!” Mrs Hudson crooned behind him, just coming down the staircase to John’s room, a mischievous smile on her face and another few twigs of mistletoe still in her grasp. John sank down onto his heels with a long, resigned sigh, knowing she was trying to help, but annoyed at how unhelpful she was actually being. She waved the mistletoe at him as she came in and then glanced at one he had been trying to take down. “What a find, eh? Some nice man offered me a small clump of them for a _very_ reasonable price! - I was thinking of getting the plastic ones but… well, it’s just not not the same, is it?”  
  
“Uh, no. No it’s not, I suppose, but… it's a bit much don’t you think, Mrs Hudson?” John questioned, trying to say it as kindly as he could manage through his simmering frustrations brought on by the day. “Surely we don’t need this many of them?”  
  
“Why not? It’s _festive_!” she told him brightly, shaking the mistletoe in his face with a giggle. “And _very_ pretty for such a strangling, murderous plant.”  
  
John faked a laugh and a smile, then rubbed his mouth and chin, “Yeah, that’s true, I suppose. I just – I'm not sure Sherlock is going to go for it—Where is he by the way?”  
  
She waved a dismissive hand, “Oh he’s off in his bedroom currently sulking. He’s already made his opinion on all of this perfectly clear. Wouldn’t stop going on about it, in fact. Kept following me around and ranting and raving. Throwing his arms around and stomping his feet. But that’s nothing new, is it? He always finds something to whinge over. Tends to do that an _awful_ lot. I paid him no mind.”   
  
John groaned, “Oh… well, _thanks_ for that Mrs Hudson,” he said, hoping she wouldn't quite catch his sarcasm. “Right, I best go and try and lure him out then, shouldn’t I? With the promise of tea and biscuits.”  
  
“And a kiss,” she added with a wink, shooing him on.

“... _What_?”

“Lure him out with the promise of a kiss, as well as tea and biscuits,” she told him, glancing in the direction of his bedroom. “I think that’s what has been bothering him the most, you know.”  
  
“What, that he'd _have_ to kiss me?” John asked with a frown, feeling a fizz of something in his gut at the thought of kissing him, at the thought of being allowed that, at wanting that so badly it made him light-headed. “I'm not going to force him to--”  
  
“No, no! That you _won’t_ kiss him!” she corrected him, taking his arm in her soft hands and leading him by his elbow. “You two have been having difficulties, I know. _I’ve noticed_. Hard not to really. There’s this… tension. A different sort of tension to one that normally hangs around with both. You know, the kind that probably is the reason the two of you can become suddenly so… distant. - Look, whatever it is that he’s done, he _is_ sorry for it. You know how he gets sometimes. He can’t help it almost. He lashes out when he’s scared and he’s scared when he’s confused, conflicted, when his mind battles with his heart.”  
  
“ _Mrs Hudson_ ,” John murmured lowly, unable to really understand how she could have discovered this, how she sounded so sure of herself. Was the tension between them that palpable? “We're _not_ – and haven't – It's _honestly_ not what you think...”  
  
As they passed into the corridor, Mrs Hudson gave his forearm a friendly pat, “Can’t hide much from me, dear,” she told him and he stared at the mistletoe that was hanging just outside Sherlock’s bedroom door, stared at what that meant and why it was that she steered him toward it in such an encouraging manner. “Now, normally, I don’t like to pry too much. But you and Sherlock sometimes need a bit of a nudge— _Sherlock_! Sherlock, John is home.” Did she really, genuinely see the situation between Sherlock and him? Was she right? What if she was? What did that mean for him? For them? With his heart in his throat, he looked at her, watched her, wondering how she thought she could see so clearly, could think the answer was so simple. This was Sherlock. This was Sherlock and him. If things went wrong, if John lost this, any of this, he wasn’t sure how he’d cope. He was sidetracked, pulled from his spiralling thoughts, when there was a shuffling noise from the other side of the door, and he felt his heart leap, something in his tummy twist oddly.  
  
“Take. Them. Down!”  
  
Mrs Hudson fondly rolled her eyes, positioning John to stand right below the hanging mistletoe, which he stared up at with a strange daunting sensation of impending doom, “It’s _tradition_ to have mistletoe up!”  
  
There was a banging thump of blatant frustration, something probably being thrown at the door, “ _Why_ must you do this? Why must it be a _constant battle_ with what I do and do not want in _my_ home.”

“ _Excuse me_? Whose home did you say it was?”   
  
“You take my _skull_ , you move around my equipment, you _throw away vital documents_!”  
  
She sighed with a shake of the head, “You had crumpled them up! How was I supposed to know that you would want them later?”  
  
“Sherlock?” John mumbled when he could manage to pull his gaze down, to focus on what was happening now and not what may happen. What could potentially break him. “It's alright. She's --” He looked at Mrs Hudson and then laughed properly, stroking along her fingers. “She's a bit irritating but she means well.”  
  
The door opened so fast, so soon, that it startled them both back a step, “She’s a lot more than just simply _irritating_!” Sherlock snarled, leaning out at them with a sour expression, eyes flitting over them. He looked wild. His hair was puffy and frizzy – the way it did when he was stressing over a case and was constantly ruffling, pulling and combing through it with his fingers – and his eyes were slightly squinted as if he was debating who to demolish with deductions first. The mistletoe loomed overhead. Waiting. Biding its time, unnoticed. “She _invades_ without preamble. Thinking she can just do what she likes, _whenever_ she likes!--”  
  
“Alright, alright,” John placated quickly, reaching for Sherlock's arm and flinching when Sherlock pulled away with a scoff, shifting his stance, hands going on his hips. “We can take them down, okay? I'll help you take them down.”  
  
“What? _No,_ don’t take them down,” Mrs Hudson beseeched them with a frown and a sigh, giving John glance of mild disappointment, as if she expected better of him, as if she expected him to side with her. “I think they look nice. And they’re a fun tradition!”  
  
“They're not _really_ fun though, are they? Not when they make Sherlock feel like _this_...” John mumbled and gestured at Sherlock, trying to look at him, trying to stare at his mouth, at his eyes, at the expression on his face. Trying not to give too much away. He could barely hear himself talk over the relentless beating of his heart. Something was building. There was anticipation in the air and John wasn’t sure how to feel about it, how to react. He was terrified. “He's not comfortable with it, so we'll take them down. I appreciate what you were trying to do but… he's _obviously_ not interested.”  
  
“Interested in _what_?” he questioned and John glanced to him after a few awkward moments to see his gaze narrow, to watch him straighten up and move to stand properly in his open doorway.

“The mistletoe and what it… _implies_.”

“I have no issue with what it implies,” Sherlock replied and John felt abruptly off balance as they locked eyes, as Sherlock stared at him. “What mistletoe implies has _never_ bothered me, John.”  
  
“Oh.”

“Ah, good. Glad to hear it,” Mrs Hudson chimed in, smiling widely and pointing upwards, causing Sherlock to glance at the hanging plant with a blink. “Don’t forget that it’s bad luck _not_ to kiss!”  
  
“ _Mrs Hudson_...” Sherlock murmured, looking down with a small exhale through his nose and a clenching wince of his eyes. “You are _ridiculous_.” Rubbing his face with both hands he then pushed back his hair, took a breath and looked back at John with an odd gleam to his eyes. “If we kiss, can we remove them?”  
  
“Oh must you? They look so nice. It’s not Christmas without a bit of mistletoe – And we might have people come around--”  
  
“How about if we keep one piece?” John tried to negotiate while he tried not to burn from the inside out, tried not to think of what Sherlock’s lips would feel like against his. He feared what he might do, what he might think. What if it really did ruin them? What if it was all part of some experiment of Sherlock’s? To see what John may do if the opportunity presented itself? He couldn’t stop thinking of all the infinite possibilities, all the ways it could go wrong. Did he really want to risk it? Risk maybe altering what they had forever? “The, um, piece in the living room is okay. It’s high enough that it’s not in the way and it's not _immediately_ obvious. The rest we could get rid of?”  
  
Mrs Hudson didn’t seem particularly happy about the idea and gave a sorrowful sort of sigh, “Why can’t there be more than one in the living room? The border between the kitchen and the living room, _and_ the one on the light?--”  
  
“ _No_. Just one on _this_ level. You can keep the one at the front door, but the rest need to go. We can combine all of them into one big piece if we must--”  
  
“Oh all right,” she mumbled, stroking her fingers through the clump she still held in her hand, “I’ll take these for myself while you deal with the rest.”  
  
“Right. Good. Glad we've come to an agreement,” John said, feeling his heartbeat being to race now that their conversation was coming to an end, now that the inevitable was coming. Sherlock was burning holes into him, seeing deep into him, reading every breath he took, every movement he made. “How the bloody hell did you get them up, anyway? Were you using that old, hazardous ladder of yours?--”  
  
“Only for a short time,” she told him with a quick shrug and a smile. “It didn’t take me long to—”  
  
“You really _shouldn’t_ have, Mrs Hudson. You’re lucky you didn’t fall and break something more than your hip!”  
  
“I’m fine--”

John couldn’t breathe with the mounting expectation, “Should have put that down on the Christmas list so I could have bought you a new one!”

“John, I was _fine_.”

John nodded, knowing he must be visibly nervous by now, that it must be obvious he was stalling, “You might not have been, that’s the point. You were close to the stairs--”

“ _John_ ,” Sherlock rumbled and John’s attention was taken by his flexing, rubbing fingers.

“All over some silly white berries,” he continued, his palms sweating. “Right. So, who wants a cuppa? Or perhaps a coffee, just to be different?”  
  
Sherlock sighed sharply in disgruntled aggravation and grabbed unexpectedly, yet not so unexpectedly, for John’s shoulders, tugging him an inch closer so he could swoop in to connect their lips, “ _There_!” he snapped seconds later, pushing past and yanking down the mistletoe that had been above them as he went, leaving John swaying in his doorway, the echoing tingle of Sherlock’s soft, warm, moist mouth still radiating through him.  
  
He had never had a reaction to a simple kiss like it before. His lips had kissed many, many people over the years – from his first tentative peck at the age of 12, to the longest relationship he had with a woman – yet he had never felt his lips tingling in such a way. It was odd, thrilling and utterly alarming at the same time. It had been so quick, the destruction of him, of them, that he knew he’d be reeling over it for days later. It was perfect and horrifying and everything he had thought kissing Sherlock might be, even kissing him for that short of time.

Looking back over his shoulder, trying to follow Sherlock’s retreating back, John twisted and almost fell to the floor, deafened by his own thoughts, his own heart beat. It had been so miniscule but he could already feel the want to try again, to document it properly, completely. As he listened to the low thud of Sherlock's footsteps as he walked away, snagging mistletoe as he went, Mrs Hudson stepped up to him and tittered, touching his hand. She said something, but he couldn’t hear her, couldn’t even be bothered to try. It was bad. It wasn’t okay.  
  
John humming non-committally in response to her, still entirely focussed on Sherlock, he tried to get a grip on himself, feeling embarrassed and ashamed, “Mrs Hudson, would you give us a minute? I need to… speak with him,” he uttered, but he wasn’t going to speak with him, he couldn’t speak with him. What would he say? He wasn’t good at those kinds of talks, not unless he was drunk, and even then he couldn’t quite grasp it. How could he explain his thoughts to Sherlock either, if they were contradictory, when they were somewhat incoherent?  
  
“Of course, John,” she told him, giving the remaining mistletoe still in her hand another wiggle as she winked, beamed, and leaned against his side, almost toppling him over. “You two enjoy yourselves. Get back on track. - All you two needed was a bit of a nudge. To be reminded of that little _something_ , you know? I know he can be a bit too much to handle sometimes, but you’re _so_ good for him, John. For each other!”  
  
John gave a watery smile and leaned in to kiss Mrs Hudson on the cheek. For a moment, ludicrously feeling like was giving away the kiss he had shared with Sherlock, like he had rubbed it onto Mrs Hudson's skin, before he pushed the thought away and walked her to the door, giving her a jaunty wave. Once she was down the first two steps, John closed the door behind him, slumping against it and rubbing his face. Why was everything so bloody difficult? Why couldn't they work out whatever the hell was going on between them in private and easily? Straightening his spine and pushing back his shoulders, John took a deep inhale and headed into the living room.  
  
Sherlock was stretching for the mistletoe in the centre of the living room, shirt pulling taut as he did so, fingers swatting, skimming and then pulling at it to bring it down, the rest of the now removed mistletoe in his other hand within an ungainly bundle, “I blame _you_ for this,” he muttered, attention focused on the task and expression tightened.

“ _Sherlock_...” John tried to interrupt, but Sherlock was seemingly on a rant now, unable or unwilling to stop his tirade against their landlady who really only had the best – if clumsy – intentions.

“You let her get away with _far too much_. You smile and shrug and let her bustle around, dusting, hoovering, doing the dishes, arranging the furniture, taking _my things_. Because of this, she now thinks she has permission to do anything she pleases – Granted, she owns the building, but we are paying for this space! We own it. This is _our_ area.”  
  
John walked and placed a hand on his lower back, holding it as steady as he could while the rest of him trembled, “I didn't know she was going to do _this_ – I'm sorry if it made you... _uncomfortable_.”  
  
“ _Me_? You were the one stalling,” Sherlock retorted a little sharply. “Clearly _you_ were uncomfortable. You’re _always_ uncomfortable when it comes to Mrs Hudson’s assumptions about us. Actually, _anyone’s_ assumptions. You sigh and glare and stammer and--” Finally able to get the mistletoe, he added it to the rest of them and then moved away, starting to rummage around in drawers until he found some ribbon and began to tie it around the large clump. “ _It doesn’t matter_. Just stop indulging her from now on.”  
  
“Wait, you think I'm _embarrassed_ that people think we're a couple?” John questioned, rushing to grab for Sherlock and turn him around, core hotly shuddering at the look in his eyes. “That has never and I mean _ever_ been the reason. I always thought I was protecting you from gossip, from… I _don’t know_ incorrect presumptions! - _Jesus_ , Sherlock I've _never_ been ashamed or uncomfortable to be linked with you. That’s not why I respond as I do… I...”  
  
Sherlock avoided eye contact then and clenched his jaw, “I don’t _need_ protecting. I don’t care what people think about me _or_ our relationship,” he replied curtly, tying a big floppy bow and then staring down at the bouquet of mistletoe. “It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. _Imbeciles_ , the lot of them. What do they know?”  
  
“I was an idiot. I _am_ an idiot. - We didn't know one another much and then – well, it all got tangled and we became friends and by then everyone _assumed_ we were together and...” John sighed, rubbing his face angrily, vibrating out of his skin. “Then I...”  
  
“Yes, you _are_ an idiot,” Sherlock agreed, but he brought his eyes back to him, mouth pursed into a shadow of a smile. He let their gaze linger for a moment and then shifted by him. “I need to hang this back up…”  
  
“Yeah,” John nodded, stepping wobbly back, taking the change of subject like an unwanted gift. “Yeah that's – yeah. Good thing you’ve got those long legs, I wouldn’t be able to do it... couldn't reach when I tried to get rid of it the time I saw it. First time I saw them all.”  
  
“You could have stood on a chair,” Sherlock replied and stretched up, fiddling with it and huffing when it took more than one second to get it securely hung.   
  
John snorted and then nudged Sherlock making him sway slightly, “Yes but I was quickly accosted by our mad landlady who was determined to make us kiss under the mistletoe. Not how I imagined our first kiss would be, I can tell you _that_!--” He stopped talking, went utterly still and felt his face burst with heat, felt it all the way to his ears. “Not that I – I _haven't_ – it's not --”  
  
Sherlock glanced at him in annoyane, cheeks going pink, “You were joking. _I get it_ ,” he uttered and stood back, hands on his hips, to admire his work, before he turned to face John expectantly. “I know what she was trying to do and I know what you were trying to do. It was quite obvious that she wanted me to kiss you and you… did not. It’s _fine_. It’s over with now, anyway. We can forget about it and move on. It was _barely_ anything. Just something for her to be pleased about and… it answered some questions...”  
  
There was a moment of deliberation, of John staring at Sherlock’s face, eyes, mouth, hands, before he stepped closer, leaned forward and pressed a soft and chaste kiss against Sherlock's parting lips, bringing his hand up to cup his cheek and hold him place. He kept his eyes open for a second or two, to see the blur of Sherlock’s own, to see them widen and flutter, and then he clenched his shut and indulged in the sweet scent of him, of the taste of his lips, the sensation of tingling goosebumps across every inch of his body as he held them both close. It was a simple thing. Their lips resting and bumping deilcately together, but it set John on fire.  
  
Sherlock exhaled a shaky breath in the cramped space between them, against John’s face, as they parted and regarded him with lidded eyes, gaze darting in quick jittery motions to and fro. He held an odd expression and the atmosphere around them had changed, had shifted and transformed into something that was almost choking. It closed in on John, invaded him, as the seconds ticked by, as the realisation of what he’d done, what this had opened up, fully bloomed. He watched Sherlock visibly swallow, mouth unfurling into a dazed sort of smile, and he felt himself drown in it, incapable of resisting it, of pushing it down. He scared him, probably more than his feelings had beforehand, and he let his hands slip down to hang at his sides, unsure what to do now. Had he ruined everything? They had started something. Properly started something. Had crossed that line that they’d been skipping close to and sliding along for days now.  
  
“ _Thatwasnice_ ,” John said in a rush before clearing his throat, mentally berating himself for making such a tit of himself so soon. For having the first words out of his mouth be a mild compliment to the very light, very small kiss that he had really just blown his mind. “I mean… it was... better than the first one—Wait, that’s not… the first one was _fine_ … but… _Christ_...”  
  
“Yes,” Sherlock breathed and broke himself from his stupor to take a shivering breath. “Yes, it _was_ …”  
  
“Funny tradition, mistletoe. It, uh, it’s awkward but… _you know_ …. you know?” John found himself stammering in a nervous ramble, feeling sick in shock and shaking with an uncontrollable mixture of fear and elation. “I mean… if its up there… we could do it again? It's what Mistletoe is for?”  
  
He snorted, almost coyly, flirtatiously, and then gave a cumbersome gesture up at the plant, “There are _many_ traditions around it. Many stories. One such tradition has people kiss with each berry that’s plucked and the kissing only stops after all the berries have been removed.” He gave it an upwards glance. “Though I don’t fancy doing that. Bit toxic those berries. As is the rest of it, really. If ingested.”  
  
“ _God_ , yeah… I had forgotten about that. After Christmas I'll let you burn it, or dissolve it. Whatever you want to do to it,” John mumbled, giving it a glance himself. “And, um, what was Mrs Hudson saying about bad luck?”  
  
“Bad luck is normally only for those who refuse a kiss,” Sherlock answered, eyes back on him, piercing into him, burning a mark wherever they shifted, digging deep into him and burrowing to his core. “ _Neither_ of us refused…”  
  
“Well… yeah, but… but, um, we should...” John mumbled nervously, eyes darting away from Sherlock's intense gaze, shocked at the words coming out of his mouth, at how little they flashed in his mind before they were tumbling out into the air. “I'm happy doing it again… just… just in case, you know?”  
  
“ _Again_?” Sherlock whispered, swallowing hard again.  
  
“Just… I mean, just when we're here. _In this spot,_ ” John insisted, mouth dry, wanting to curl up in mortification. What was he saying? “Because of the... _mistletoe_ … and all that it… _implies_...”  
  
“...Implies, yes,” Sherlock echoed and gave another upwards glance to it, fingers rubbing together as he gave the situation a contemplating frown. “If Mrs Hudson _hadn’t_ have forced this, hadn’t have put any of this _horrid_ stuff up, would you have kissed me _without_ it? At… any… time?” Before John could answer though, before he could stop himself from choking on breath and words both, Sherlock shook his head and ducked down, nudging their noses together as he kissed John again.

This time he did it slowly. Achingly slowly. Applying a bit more pressure when they were finally connected and sending John’s eyes rolling up, his legs wobbling. He reached out for Sherlock, grasping him like a drowning man for a life-raft, one unsteady hand going for his slim waist and the other cupping his cheek, learning the feel of him, branding himself with it. John wanted to deepen the kiss in abandon, wanted to push his tongue into the warmth of Sherlock's mouth, wanted to take and own and then give in equal measure, but he was petrified by what that lead to, knowing that to go through with that really meant there was no way back. What the hell was he doing? Warnings rang out in his head as he continued the pressure, continued kissing him, never pulling away, even as the thoughts that rolled about in his head got louder and more frantic, more shrill. This could be a disaster. This was a disaster.

When the kiss ended, Sherlock turned his head away to rest their temples together, breathing heavily, and then turned to suddenly begin dotting John’s face with tender, quivering pecks as if in a trance, “You smell like sick people…” he mumbled casually, as if they weren’t pressed together in the centre of the room, as if wasn’t taking hold of John, cradling his jaw, and turning his head this way and that to expose more skin for him to smear his hot mouth against.   
  
It shattered the ambiance and broke the tension between them, and John jerked with a choking cough, beginning to laugh so hard that he had to bend at the waist and bury his face into Sherlock's chest, “ _That_ … that wasn't _exactly_ the comment I was hoping to hear,” he got out between gasping breaths, “but it’s so very _you_ , so very _Sherlock_...”  
  
“It’s the truth, you _do_ smell like sick people,” Sherlock told him with a laugh of his own, “and decaf. Horrible, _horrible_ decaf.”  
  
“Yeah well, I've cut back on the caffeine at work as it was making me too jittery,” John said, letting his arms slip down, watching as they diverted, as if with a mind of their own, to wrap around Sherlock's waist. “I, uh, I _was_ planning on going for a bath. A long, warm, _quiet_ bath. But then Mrs Hudson intervened and – plans changed...”  
  
Sherlock gave him a tiny grin in response and angled John’s face again, nosing down to kiss him once more, as if they always did it, as if it wasn’t new, wasn’t awkward and frightening and big, “You can bathe later,” he murmured against John’s mouth.  
  
“Yeah?” John breathed, allowing Sherlock to give him that gentle kiss, that sweet caress, and ignoring the inflamed rush of lubricious craving, “The smell of rancid sick from the imbeciles of London isn't putting you off me?”  
  
“ _Nothing_ puts me off you, I’m afraid,” Sherlock told him, eyes on John’s lips with greedy abandon, a look that made his stomach flip in dizzying desire. “I know something _should_ … but I have yet to find it.”  
  
“Not even my cooking?” John asked, tilting his head to let their chins softly bump and meeting Sherlock's eyes, electricity fizzling between them, “Or my sense of style? Which is _brilliant_ by the way...”  
  
“You _annoy_ me by all of that, but the annoyance doesn’t put me off, no,” Sherlock replied, tilting his head as well. “There are _so many_ things you do wrong. So many stupid things that you say. But that doesn’t change a thing...”  
  
John let himself brush his way into the corner of Sherlock's quirking top lip, “So, you're telling me I can continue doing all of those annoying things, forever, with no repercussions? Okay. _G_ _ood_ ,” he huffed around a chuckle and pulled back, nudging Sherlock's chin with his nose. “I won’t try and change my ways then. Not at all. No matter how many times you snarl at me—”  
  
“That’s not _at all_ what I’m saying, what I meant,” he huffed, chasing him as if magnetised, pushing their faces closer and closer, wanting another kiss, then another, and another. “Stop moving away…”  
  
“I'm not… I'm just – adventuring around your face, as you did to mine,” John whispered, flushing at his own words and remaining still, only partly aware of his thumbs as they stroked up and down Sherlock's spine, keeping a steady rhythm. “You annoy me too… but it doesn't change anything either. For what it’s worth.”  
  
“... Perhaps not _now_ , no,” Sherlock mumbled, pressing his lips to more and more areas of John’s face, though always going back to his mouth, always introducing a new kiss with new pressure, with a building need.  
  
“ _Stop it_. If you want me to trust that your feelings will… will remain the same, then you need to trust _mine_. - You… I don’t want to you be be worried about anything. I'll _always_ be your friend. Regardless. Of _anything_. Even if… we… you know… if we spend some time… some time apart for whatever reason. I need you to know that I’ll _never_ stop being a friend to you.”  
  
Sherlock slowed to a pause and cupped John’s head in his hands carefully, caressing a sweep across each cheek, “I hope so,” he said quietly.  
  
“I _know_ so,” John replied, turning his head and pressing his mouth to Sherlock's inner wrist, feeling somehow that it was more intimate than the actual kissing they had been doing. A declaration. A promise. “You're the... _only_ person who has made me feel like I'm alive since I left the army. That’s… that’s nothing to be sniffed at. Nothing to ignore.”  
  
Humming with a smile, though seeming unconvinced, Sherlock nuzzled into his jaw and then stepped away completely, “Good to know...” he nodded and after staring at him, examining him, and looking shyly down at the ground, he made a flapping gesture toward the bathroom. “Now you may bathe… I’ll… wait until you’re out for that cuppa.”  
  
John felt a little like he was going to topple over and made a grunting noise as he got steady onto his feet, pushing a hand through his hair, “Yeah. Yeah, okay...” he replied, looking up at the bunch of mistletoe with a deep jerky sigh and heading to the bathroom.

**Author's Note:**

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